


Subatomic

by probablynotadalek



Category: Ant-Man (2015), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Ant-Man (2015) Spoilers, Gen, Hank Mention, Janet-centric, Scott doesnt do anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-16
Updated: 2015-08-16
Packaged: 2018-04-14 23:20:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4583982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/probablynotadalek/pseuds/probablynotadalek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>When Janet decided she wanted to die, she opened the helmet. To her despair, she could still breathe.</em><br/> <br/>Janet Van Dyne spent decades subatomic, thinking she would never see her family again. Every second was torture.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Subatomic

When Janet decided she wanted to die, she opened the helmet. She breathed out, thinking about everything she had lost, everyone she knew, all of her friends, Hank and Hope. She had lost Hope. It was oddly poetic, she found herself thinking as she was giving up.

She breathed out until there was nothing left in her lungs, then opened the helmet. 

The thing in front of her looked like a nebula, which she also considered poetic. The smallest point in the universe was the same as what had created it. 

A single tear slid down her cheek. She held her breath until her lungs stung with the effort and against her will they expanded, sucking in a breath. The pain subsided and she breathed out again, choking back a sob. 

To her despair, she could still breathe. 

For the first time since she had started shrinking, she let herself cry.

***

Janet tried to kill herself three times. First she opened the helmet. When that didn’t work, she tried to force herself to stop breathing. All that did was make her pass out for a few blessed moments before she came back to the blank space she was trapped in. The third time she had attempted to shoot herself with the Stingers Hank had made but the suit had run out of power as she shrank.

Then she gave up on that, too. 

***

Eventually she started forgetting. She tried not to, tried to hang on to the memories, reciting them behind closed eyelids. She ran through her life again and again, trying to hold tight to every detail.

Try as she might, she couldn’t stop it. She forgot the feel of grass under her feet, the sun on her shoulders, the breeze in her face. She forgot the feeling of shrinking and growing, the rush of wind as she flew, the sense of accomplishment when she won. She forgot Hank’s voice, forgot what it felt like to be with him, to kiss him, to hold his hand, forgot what it felt like when they fell asleep curled against each other, a tangled mess of legs and arms and love. She forgot Hope, her face, her voice, her smile, her laugh. 

She forgot names and places, people she had once loved, and it tore her apart to think that she could ever forget her family.

***

Janet hated it.

She hated where she was, the nebula-like area she floated in. Once, it had taken her breath away, but now it forced every breath into her but deprived her of any touch, and sound, any contact with anything that could remind her she was human. 

She hated time. She hated that it didn’t seem to pass where she was, hated that she never got hungry or thirsty or tired, hated that she didn’t feel that she was getting any older. She hated that despite the fact that time didn’t seem to exist it all it still felt like time was dragging on for an eternity. 

She hated that she had stopped feeling. She had become numb to everything around her, ignoring her own emotions just to keep from crying again.

She hated the action that brought her there. Hated the missile that had caused her to do it. Hated the war that had launched it. Hated the people that had started that. 

She hated everything.

***

There were a few things she never hated.

She never hated what she did, not for one second. She was there because she saved countless people who would have died had that misslie been detected. A world war was stopped by her actions, and she had to hold on to that.

She never hated Hank. This wasn’t his fault, she had done it. He had tried to keep her from it. She held onto the hope that he was looking for her.

She never hated Hope. She couldn’t, the girl would have no idea what happened, she wouldn’t understand. Janet longed to see her again, to hold her and watch her and see her grow up.

***

There was movement. It wasn’t much and it was just out of the corner of her eye, but it was a beacon against the nothingness Janet had become accustomed to. She turned to it, watching it spin. The lines of red and silver looked familiar, almost like-

“Hank!” She yelled and propelled herself forward, willing her body to move toward him, but he was fiddling with his regulator, changing it, and she was no where near him when he disappeared just as quickly as he had come.

***

Janet knows Hank can find her now, and it excites her in a way she never thought she could feel again.

There’s one question that bothers her, tugging at her mind and threatening to crush any hope she had. 

Why did he leave? 

If Hank was looking for her, why didn’t he stay? 

Maybe he didn’t see her, and moved to look somewhere else. Maybe he kept shrinking, down to something smaller than she was. Maybe he was needed out there. Maybe the suit had broken. 

Maybe he didn’t care.

***

The excitement of seeing Hank has almost worn out when Janet sees another movement.

It looks like the Ant-Man suit, but it has wings, no it looks like her suit but that’s impossible. She remembers something long forgotten, a new suit she and Hank had worked on. The figure sees her and moves closer, and yes, that is the suit she made. 

The figure reaches her and stills for a moment. The mask rises, and she sees a face that looks like the one she remembers having but eyes like Hanks, a face that is smiling through tears.

“Hope,” she whispers as the woman pulls her into a hug. Janet hears faint sobs.

“Mom,” Hope whispers. “I found you. I finally found you.” Hope pulls away, not taking her hand off Janet’s shoulder. “Let’s go home.”

Janet doesn’t respond as Hope puts something in her regulator. 

With more joy than she ever thought possible, Janet feels herself starting to grow.

**Author's Note:**

> Guess who just saw Ant-Man, and shamelessly loved it? As soon as the movie finished, I couldn't get this out of my head. Sorry not sorry.


End file.
